OUT OF A COFFIN.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 387, 24 July 1889, Page 3

OUT OF A COFFIN.

A remarkable case of catalepsy is reported from South St. Louis, says the Cincinnati 'Enquirer.' A young* married woman,; ?s years of age, , was in her coffin about to be taken out for burial, when Jier brother'-in-Jaw saw her arm move, ordered her taken out of the coffin at once, and' called in two physicians, who after an examination pronnunced life not extinct -and began a process of resuscitation. Their efforts were successful, and the woman was in a short time brought back to consciousness.' . Ber si&ter, a young married woman living: at 721, Sou Lh Fourth-street, and from whom an account of the case was obtained, asked that the patient's name or exact address be not published, as she was too weak yet to stand the excitement that might result from too much notoriety of the case. Thenames of the attending physicians were, however, given, and they corroborated the statement. She said : ' Last Monday my sister, who had been sick for bub a few days, died, as far as we could see, and the attending physician pronounced her dead, and her husband proceeded to make arrangements for the funeral. A coffin waa secured, and when bhe supposed corpse was dressed it was laid in the coffin. The intention was to have the funeral Tuesday afternoon. Friends of the family visited the house and mourned over the body from which the spirit had, it was believed, departed. On Tuesday afternoon, a short time before the closing: of the coffin was to have taken place, my brother-in-law was standing beside the bier looking; on the face of his wife, when his little boy came into tho room and said, " I want to look at mamma." ' Just then the arm of my sister moved. My husband saw it, and was naturally very much startled, lie informed those in the room in an excited manner what he had seen, and my sister was at once taken from the coffin and placed on a bed and two physicians summoned. They placed a glass in front of my sistei's face, and could at once perceive the feigns of breath upon it. They then began to work with her, and in a short time more positive signs of life began to appear. She kept getting better all the tiine, until finally she became conscious.' ' She is conscious now ?' 'Yes. She has had no relapse, and is steadily improving, but is still very weak, and until she is good and strong again we don't want to have anything said about the case.' ' Was she conscious during the time she was in a cataleptic state ?' { Yes. That is the most terrible feature about it. Sho knew perfectly everything that was going on around her. When &he was being dressed for burial she realised what was being done, and tried her best to show signs of life, but could not do so. When she Mas placed in the coffin an awful feeling of what was to be her doom came ovor her, she says, and she tried to scream, and thought that she succeeded, • but, of, course, , she. did not. When sj)e v came, to, and related to us an account of the mental torture she had. experienced during the time her trancp lasted,, she said : " Where were you all when I screamed ?" We told her that she had not screamed, or we surely would have heard her. " Well," she said", " I tried to scream often, and thought that once I had succeeded in emitting a shriek. " When she was lying in the coffin she tried to move, but failed until her little child came running into the room and asked to look at her. Then her arm cramped, and my husband, who was standing by the coffin, fortunately happened to see it. Had he not she would ceitainly have been buried alive.'